Baptism by Fire
by Rhino7
Summary: Sora didn’t see how torching the memory of their last normal days was closure, but then again he didn’t see a lot of things that made sense to other people. Tag-shot for Every Titanic Sinks. Rated for a few bad words.


**Baptism by Fire**

**By Rhino7**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts, its characters or storyline. This one-shot is mine. This has been floating around in my head for a while, ever since I wrote **_**Every Titanic Sinks**_**. I was amazed at how much readers liked it. I've been wanting to write something just as deep for Sora. I get tired of reading Riku angst sometimes, especially when Sora is depicted in it as a bumbling idiot who thinks of nothing but lollipops and rainbows. So this is my meek attempt at balancing that out a little bit. I apologize for any OOCness but it was necessary.**

**This piece is not as eloquent or poetic as **_**Every Titanic Sinks**_** was intended to be. This was on purpose, because Sora is not poetic…at all. I think I started rambling about halfway through it, since I only had a vague idea of where I was going with it, but I'm still relatively satisfied with how it came out…as satisfied as I ever get anyway. I've decided to round these out to a trilogy of one-shots. The first was **_**Every Titanic Sinks**_**. This is the second part, and the third will be centric to Kairi, title still pending. I'm thinking of calling this series the Horizon Trilogy…because I like to name things.**

**Anyway, each part of this trilogy stands on its own and you don't need to read one to understand the others. They do reference each other though, and I do recommend you read all three for the entire story. As always, constructive feedback is always welcome and appreciated!**

**..:--X--:..**

It's hard to smile when it rains.

Well, technically it wasn't raining yet, but Sora could tell it would be pouring by the end of the hour.

The sun rose in a blanket of clouds, giving daybreak the repressive feel of a stifling dawn. No vibrant pinks or oranges or golds to twinkle the eyes of the sky today. Like a receding tide, the moon relinquished power to the sun, taking its stars with it but leaving the mask of overcast and dark shades.

The cloud ushered forward like a protective guard for the sun, shepherding the chill and granting a tranquil sense of calm to the islands. To put it in plain terms, the sky was as thick as soup. There were no other people outside as Sora left his house an hour before dawn that morning.

He left a note on the fridge: "Gone to the island all day. Phone's dead." He never turned his phone on, although it was fully charged. He didn't want his mom calling when he was in the middle of what he was planning to do. He had a small window of opportunity as it was, especially if the weather had its way today.

The early morning fog quickly masked his wake of escape until he was out on the water. His little rowboat creaked and groaned in the lobbing, foamy water as Sora rowed to the other island. It was slow work. The air was so thick with moisture from the fog that little beads of water formed a film over his bare arms and face. Some of it settled on his eyelashes and he blinked repeatedly to keep his vision clear.

Light was just beginning to filter through the mist at the horizon when he climbed out of the boat and dragged it out of the shallows to the beach. The sky looked washed out and gray, and it did nothing to cheer up the young Keybearer as he trudged across the beach alone toward the cove.

Maybe nature knew what he was up to, and was trying to imitate his mood in terms of weather.

Wiping his face clear of another layer of filmy beads, Sora pushed through the door that led to the cove and walked across the wooden scaffolds leading to the coconut area. The overcast clouds seemed to be insulating the island, blocking all sounds from breaking the dull silence. He could hardly even hear the waves as they crashed on the sifting sand of the beach. But he could hear the groaning wood.

There it was.

Sora narrowed his eyes at the bloated, swollen body and the fraying, crusted knots hanging from the spine of it. The tide hadn't touched it yet. The mast was bowed and swaying with the light breeze. He dropped from the ridge to the sand and walked over to the derelict mass. Frowning, he nudged it with the toe of his shoe and was surprised that it didn't sag under the prodding. It was completely dry. The wood was cracked and ready, like it had been waiting for him.

Fucking raft.

Sora bristled and nudged it again, harder this time. He could smell the salt that had dried on the wood and could almost hear the gnashing of the old ropes against the grain of the wood. He kicked it again and punched the mast in frustration. It had been three months since he and Riku and Kairi had returned home. You'd think after two years of fighting Heartless and Nobodies and other monsters, a few planks of wood and logs tied together wouldn't have given him goosebumps.

Thunder snarled softly overhead.

Exhaling heavily, he scanned the horizon. He didn't like being alone, never had. What was the point of being alone and sad and quiet when he could be loud and happy with his friends, with his family? The whole aloof and broody thing was Riku's MO, not Sora's. His friend had been doing the aloof and broody thing a lot lately, and Sora had come to respect that. On a whim, not long after they had returned home, he had gone off by himself, just to try it out. It was…depressing. Being alone meant a lot of one-sided mental conversations which quickly led to thinking and reminiscing and looking back. As far as Sora was concerned, the past had happened, it was done, and nothing he did could change it.

Then the sun had set.

That first sunset Sora had witnessed, just sitting by himself on the beach, had managed to put a cork in his thinking. The way the harsh reds and golds melted into cool pinks, purples, and blues was relaxing. The dying rays of the sun, sparkling across the sloshing ocean surface and dancing through the translucent clouds of dusk, fought to light the island for as long as they could before being stifled by the dark of the night.

Just another day passed.

Sunrise was different. It was like a fresh breath after a long yawn, new and clear. Sora was never much of a morning person. He preferred to get up at the crack of noon, so sunrises were few and far between for him. Today was different though. Not for the first time since coming home, he hadn't been able to sleep. Tossing, turning, rolling over, and burying his face in a pillow had no effort whatsoever.

The raft had to go.

It was like a cancer, festering and feeding off of all of them. Every time Sora looked at it, it only reminded him of what his life had been like. It symbolized innocence, childishness, and curiosity in a world that was all too suddenly dark, old, and sharp. Steeling himself, Sora pinched the bridge of his nose and pushed the thoughts away.

No. Angst was Riku's thing. Sora was supposed to be the cheerful one.

Keeping that in mind, Sora ran a hand along the belly of the mast, feeling the coarse grain tug at his fingertips. Abandoned before her maiden voyage, untainted, and irreverent despite it all: Sora tilted his head and hardened his eyes. It was time to remove the tumor.

It was time to cut this cancer out of his and his friends' lives.

He stepped off the raft and took note of the tide, edging closer, trying to sneak up on him. Kneeling down, he prodded at the individual planks lashed together at the base. The ropes were old and had grown together at the knots, inseparable. Nothing was inseparable. He reached at his belt and pulled out his dad's multi-tool knife. Flipping out the widest, sharpest setting, he started sawing at the ropes.

The sun seemed content to lounge behind the clouds, dropping an occasional column of light through the mass, around the bulging coils of thunder that were scowling more frequently as the time passed. The low rumblings covered up any other natural sounds. No birds were squawking, no animals were moving rocks, and no trees were groaning in the wind. Just the ocean foamed over the sand and the ropes frayed and snapped under the blade of Sora's knife.

Cutting the base apart took much less time than Sora had thought it would. The rope had been thin and dry and frayed, and it had given way with a little prompting from the knife. The thick logs of wood toppled free from the lanky frame of the raft, leaving it stripped to bones and mast. Standing, Sora kicked the rest of the frame apart and slid the knife back to his belt. The frame buckled under the assault and collapsed, releasing the base of the mast.

The tower of wood bobbed once and fell forward, like a soldier struck down, and fell to rest beside the comrades of its base, defeated.

The mass of ruined and bowed wood resembled nothing like a raft now. Technically he was done. He could just walk away and never see the raft again. The raft was dead and gone, along with all of its ideas and curiosities. Only he wasn't done. The evidence was still here, glaring at him like some dishonored relative, or a betrayed friend.

Biting his lip, Sora looked up at the sky. The clouds were thick with water and hanging low in the sky. A few flickers of lightning forked across them like white veins, prompting the bodies to release the downpour they were holding back. Squinting, Sora gauged he had half an hour at most before the storm began.

Working quickly, he dragged every scrap of wood and rope from the resting place of the raft away from the shore and toward the small cave at the base of the cliffs encircling the cove. The cave wasn't large; it was hardly ten feet deep, five feet wide and barely that tall. Sora had to hunch over to drag the pieces inside. Five minutes after he stacked the last chunk of wood inside, the rain began.

The sky sighed with delight as it finally unleashed the rain. The drops were heavy and splattered against the sand, sending little droplets of its own in its wake. The sand darkened with the water and the coconut trees' leaves drooped as the water weighed them down. The rain quickly filled the deep grooves where the raft had been resting for the past two years, liberated just moments earlier.

Sora turned his back on the rain, carefully arranging and stacking the wood pieces in the deepest part of the cave, detangling as much of the frayed rope as he could and clumping it together near the center. He held up a long strand of fuzzy rope. The wood was all dry and crisp.

It would burn quickly.

"Fire." He said softly.

At the whispered request, orange flickered at the top fringe of the rope, quickly climbing the frays and licking at his fingers. Sora dropped the burning strand onto the rest of the rope, which immediately caught fire. Sora watched it burn. The fringes curled and blackened, shrinking into themselves as the fire consumed them. The smell of burning material filled the small cave and Sora inhaled deeply.

The events of the previous night emerged from the back of his mind and plastered themselves across his vision, blotting out the breathing flames that were beginning to tickle at the larger planks of wood. This was why he wanted to be alone. It was easier. Call it cowardice, but Sora was no coward. He clenched his jaw convulsively. He loved his friends. No one could ever doubt that. He had fought for them, bled for them, cried for them, and nearly died for them.

No, it wasn't that he didn't love them that he didn't want them here with him at the moment. It was…It was everything. Kairi could barely look at the raft and Riku had become obsessed with it. They never brought up getting rid of it or doing anything about it. This wasn't their problem. It was Sora's. He couldn't stand existing on the same island with it any longer. The What-Ifs were killing him.

So he enjoyed watching the damned thing burn.

Smoke filled the cave and the heat was making Sora's eyes water, slurring the reds and yellows and browns as the fire burned through the wood. The cave was small enough as it was, and though not claustrophobic, Sora felt stifled by the burning wood and solid rock walls surrounding him and backed out of the cave.

The rain landed like a comforting hand against his back, engulfing him in icy drops of water that cooled his face and soothed the irritation around his eyes. Turning his back to the cave, he tilted his face toward the sky and closed his eyes. A cascade of icy water fell from the heavens, crashing over his skull and shoulders, running in rivulets down his torso and arms to seep into the sand at his feet. As the water soaked through his hair, plastering the spikes to his scalp, Sora sank to his knees, eyes still closed, hands still loose at his sides.

Things were never going to be the same.

There weren't going to ever be any take-backs. It was etched in stone, so to speak. Nothing could ever make the past undo itself. History was history. Destiny Islands had fallen. Kairi had lost her heart. Riku had chosen darkness. The Keyblade had chosen Sora. And Sora had chosen…to do this alone.

Things really had changed.

None of them were the same. Even Selphie, Tidus, Wakka, his parents, his schoolmates: they were different. They didn't remember the invasion, the Heartless, or the war, but they had changed. Or maybe it was just Sora who had changed. It would have been impossible not to. He wasn't the same fourteen year old who had raced with his friends across the beach and helped build a flimsy raft to cross an ocean and find…find what? Adventure?

The adventure had come from the skies in the form of a dark cloud of black creatures with milky white eyes. Adventure had sought him out as a sword and a key and a path to a place he had never found. Peace. That was the only thing adventure hadn't thrown at him was peace. Kairi got to be a princess of light and watch as their home regenerated, stitching itself back together. Riku got to face his demons and become a better friend, redeeming himself. The road hadn't been a smooth one, but Kairi and Riku found rescue, found solace, found peace.

Sora found only responsibility.

What kind of messed up universe was this? Okay, Sora, here's the deal. You get this shiny weapon, you get to meet all these interesting people, you get to visit all these crazy worlds, and you get to be a hero. There's a catch though. You must use this weapon to defeat the source of all evil and all its minions.

Fine, so he did that. Nope, sorry, can't go home yet. Turned out that wasn't the source of all evil and your friends still aren't safe. Plus, you're heart has been split in half. Didn't you read the fine print? Fight on, boy! Talk about loopholes, it was a contract worthy of Hades.

Still on his knees, Sora slumped forward, rolling his shoulders and grasping handfuls of sand in each palm. Then, just as he was on the verge of righting the wrongs of the universe with the Keyblade, he finds out that he has to leave all his new friends and give up all of the power and responsibility he's gained, hell, he's EARNED, for what? A high schooler's life?

Thunder cooed empathetically.

Tilting back, Sora flopped backwards off his knees and landed on his back on the sand. Rain bit at his eyes but he pried them open, glaring defiantly up at the skies.

"What do you want from me?"

It was a whispered question.

The only answer he got was a particularly large drop of rain splashing in his eye. Blinking his vision clear, he spread his limbs across the sand and drank in the feel of the grain rolling across his skin. He breathed in deep, long pulls, stretching his lungs to full capacity. His throat hitched and he coughed, deflating on the sand.

"Yeah, that's what I thought." He hissed.

Stretching his neck, he looked upside down at the cave. He could still see the fire eating through the remains of the raft, sizzling and crackling occasionally. Relaxing to stare back up at the sky, he lifted a hand and flattened his palm toward the clouds, bending his fingers carefully and letting his heart flow to warm the tips of his fingers, mentally ordering the Keyblade to appear.

Nothing happened.

Breathing deeply through his nose, he tried again, baring his fingers so that they were bent at rigid, angry angles toward his hand, demanding that the weapon come to its master's hand. His fingers closed around empty air and he gagged slightly, choking on the derelict space where he used to hold the warm steel of the handle.

Tears bit at his eyes and he dropped his arm to the sand with a wet slap.

So that was it then. He had served his purpose and now he was waiting to be recycled. His sole use for Kingdom Hearts was to do its bidding, play bodyguard for the other realm and hero for the other worlds. He had been a slave to the Keyblade, and once he had done what needed to be done, it had left him, just like he and his friends had left that raft.

He should have been happy.

He was home. He was alive. His friends and family were safe. The worlds had been restored. Evil had been vanquished and the universe was in balance again. Shouldn't he have been happy? He was sounding like some whiny brat. Well, he was happy, at its most basic level. With each layer that he canvassed, though, the ice was thinner and thinner.

Maybe it was okay to be sad sometimes.

Feeling his heart pounding in his ears, Sora swallowed hard and gritted his teeth. Why was this so hard? Leaving the life of safety and love and family for the life of a soldier, a warrior, and a Keybearer had been difficult. It had been a stressful transition and he had the scars on his mind and body to prove it. He had never considered coming home would be so hard when he was still out there fighting.

The night he came home, though, he knew. Nothing had changed, but everything was different. Exhaling, Sora closed his eyes and flexed his fingers in the sand. So what was the point of burning the raft if it wouldn't change anything? Burning it wasn't going to make Kairi forget losing her heart. It wasn't going to stitch Riku's psyche back together. It sure as Hell wasn't going to erase the last two years, burn away the memories like splinters from a log.

Maybe that okay.

Sora didn't want to forget. That wasn't the point of all this. Then what? What had possessed him to get out of bed, row over here, and burn that thing, not to mention just lie in the sand during a rain storm? Just thinking about the fire consuming those pieces of wood made him feel better.

Better wasn't really the right word. It was true, but it was more than that. Perhaps it was that closure thing Kairi had been talking about. Sora didn't see how torching the memory of their last normal days was closure, but then again he didn't see a lot of things that made sense to other people.

Was that why the Keyblade had chosen him? Riku had said that the Keyblade had originally been meant for him, but when Riku had chosen the darkness, the sword had been forced to seek alternative means, and Sora had been the first noble idiot it came across. Riku had been under Maleficent's illusion then, but the words still rang in his ears sometimes.

He had done a good job though, hadn't he? The universe was still in tact. Most of the worlds had even been regenerated. The Heartless were all but gone, and Organization XIII was just a nasty memory. It was pretty impressive for a fifteen year old; at least he thought so. Sixteen now, technically. At sixteen, he'd accomplished all of that, but he still had to take that stupid driving test.

Sora frowned. Now he was just rambling.

Anyway, why, after all this time, was the Keyblade suddenly refusing him? It had never disobeyed him before. It always came when he summoned it. The war was over, mass threats had been wiped out, and the worlds were safe again. That could have been the reason. Peace had been established, so the Keyblade wasn't needed any longer. It wasn't that Sora wasn't needed, just the weapon.

Sora groaned and bumped his head against the ground. This was why he didn't get up early! It was far too much extra time to sit around and think. Thinking never led to anything good. Riku was a morning person. That's why he was so messed up in the head.

Dragging himself into a sitting position, he climbed slowly to his feet and wandered over to the shoreline. The tide had come in a little more, filling in the trenches were the raft had been an hour earlier. Hands on his hips, Sora kicked at the same, further dismantling the ruts and letting the water smooth out the rest of it.

Just one less thing to worry about.

He trudged back into the cave, welcoming the oven-like feel of the interior now that he was soaked to bone and freezing. Dropping to his backside in the shallow dirt of the cave, he picked up a stick and poked at the fire with it, not bothering to wipe the tears still loitering around in the hollows of his eyes.

The flames had turned most of the wood black and crumbly white, still nibbling at the edges. The logs shifted as they crumbled and Sora was relieved to see a pile of gathering ash at the base of the coarse fire pit.

The warmth from the fire began to soak into his wet clothes, so at least now they were warm wet clothes. Sora made a face and pushed his hair out of his face, shivering and huddling closer to the fire. Or maybe it was farther from the cold rain. Sora scoffed and inwardly scolded himself. Stop analyzing! You're not a philosopher!

He lost track of how long he stayed in that cave, watching the raft burn. The rain continued to fall in a torrential downpour. The lightning and subsequent thunder subsided after about an hour, and the clouds began to lighten as they dehydrated. The sun lowered more columns of light to the island, glistening off the streams trailing from leaves and the murky puddles at the base of the cliffs.

Sora watched the fire thrive across the field of wood, and then watched it slowly die as the wood grew brittle and barren. The heat sapped the moisture from his clothes and the water lingered only as a thin film over his skin. His shorts and shirt felt stiff and crinkled as he moved, unlocking his arms from his knees and stretching his back as he straightened, his neck cracking at the motion.

Standing and stretching, he propped one elbow on his knee as he bent over, extending one hand over the flickering flames. The fire bowed under his hand, tentatively reaching up to lick at his fingers. Sora wound his fingers through the wisps of silvery smoke, grimacing at the heat and removing his hand from the proximity of the fire. He looked at his hand and studied the pink, warmed skin of his palm. He hadn't just burned himself, but he'd gotten close. He could almost hear his mother's voice: "Don't play with matches!" Ah, Mom.

The sky outside was still gray and ugly, but the brightness of the sun shining behind the clouds cast a serpentine lining around the edges of the horizon, clear and pure. There was no real color. No blues or oranges or golds like last night's sunset, but it was still beautiful, in its own ugly way.

He wasn't wearing a watch, but the sun was high enough behind the clouds to mean that most of the village would be awake now. Sora cringed slightly at the mental image of his mom reading that he'd purposely left his phone at home and gone off alone. Shoulders drooping, he ran a hand through his hair and turned back to the cave.

Sora shoved his hands in his pockets and kicked sand onto the dying embers of the fire. There was no more wood remaining. It was all ash and black flakes. He kicked more sand over the ashes and rubbed his heel around the piles, mixing the black ash with the white-brown sand. Soon the entire floor of the cave was a murky brown color, all of the ash had been assimilated.

Like nothing had ever happened.

Satisfied, Sora stepped out of the cave and pushed the giant rock in front of it, blocking the mouth of it. He backed up and turned his back on the hidden cave, facing the beach with his hands on his hips. The shoreline was smooth and the sand was still wet from the rain at daybreak. Any evidence that there had been a raft present had been washed away by the tide…or burned in the cave.

Just seeing the empty slot on the beach made Sora feel lighter, his shoulders feel straighter. Maybe burning that raft had done him some good. Closure. He wasn't completely sure what he needed to close, but a Fire Spell had done the trick. He walked over to the empty space on the beach, his lips flattening.

Riku would probably come here again sometime this week. Kairi was bound to notice it was gone too, even though they rarely hung out at the cove anymore. Sora chewed the inside of his cheek. He'd worry about that later. He was sure neither of them would be sad to see it go. It was just another attachment to the past. They should focus their energies toward the future. They hadn't heard anything from King Mickey or any of the Allied forces since they had returned three months ago. That didn't mean nothing was happening; it just meant nothing big enough or bad enough was happening.

Which was good, he supposed.

Yawning, Sora left the cove and headed back to the main beach. The shoreline looked subdued without the sun beaming down at it. The sand looked gray and the water looked murky, sloshing and foaming over the beach. Even the trees looked a little dull from the looming clouds overcast above the island. The clouds were considerably lighter, not so stormy looking, but still ominous. It would probably rain again later tonight, if the humidity in the air was any indication.

Sora squinted at the horizon. He could see two boats sailing over, roughly halfway between the main island and this one. It looked like Riku and Wakka. Then he remembered. That was right; Wakka had recruited Riku to help him set up a prank on Tidus, something about seagull eggs and the hollow in the canopy of the Great Tree.

He snickered and moved his hands behind his head, lacing his fingers together and standing alone on the beach. They had probably spotted him already, but that was okay. He hadn't been trying to hide. Although they were probably suspicious as to why the infamous noon-riser was already up and over here before, well, noon.

Stranger things had happened.

Sora smiled and waved back when Wakka threw an arm up in greeting. Lowering his arm, Sora looked at his hand. Dark gray ash had dusted his palm. He rubbed the fingers of his clean hand against the dust. Wasn't there some bird or creature that was reborn from its own ashes? The phoenix, that was right. It was weird to think of anything finding life in fire and ashes.

Wiping his hand off on the thigh of his shorts, Sora ruffled his damp hair and looked up at the cloudy sky. It had never answered his questions or granted him any comfort, but it had lent a breeze to nourish the flames that cremated the raft, and for that he had to be grateful.

A soft gust blew off the surface of the ocean, greeting his face with the familiar sting of warm salt and mist. Sora breathed in and exhaled in a rush. Maybe sunrise was just as beautiful as sunset, even without all the colors and vibrance. Maybe, its own ugly way, the beginning of the day was as peaceful as the ending.

Huh. Peaceful.

That was the right word he'd been looking for.

"Thanks." He said under his breath, head tilted toward the ruffled, murky clouds.

And the silence was gratifying enough.


End file.
